"By this time my men came running down the bank, shouting that Weathersford was coming. With our three canoes we crossed them all over, and got safely back to the fort."
The Hornet and the Peacock—The Chesapeake and the Shannon—The Argus and the Pelican—The Enterprise and the Boxer—Decatur blockaded at New London—A New Embargo.
The brilliant victories achieved on the ocean in 1812 reversed the opinion the Government had entertained as to the value of the navy, and early in 1813 Congress authorized the building of four ships-of-the-line, six frigates, six sloops-of-war, and as many vessels on the lakes as the service might require.
But in the second year of the war the American sailor did not meet with that uniform success which in the first year had surprised and confounded the self-styled Mistress of the Seas. One battle, in which a noble ship was lost and many lives were sacrificed, through drunkenness, was a grievous mortification to the whole American people. The commander of the defeated vessel was fortunate in not surviving the action, as he would probably have been court-martialled and disgraced.
The first naval engagement of the year took place in West Indian waters. Lieutenant James Lawrence, in the Hornet, of twenty guns, was cruising up and down the coast of Guiana, and had taken few prizes, when on the 24th of February sighted the English brig Peacock, Captain Peake, which carried twenty guns. Both drew down upon each other. They passed within half pistol-shot; and as they passed, each delivered the full broadside of the larboard battery. The Peacock then put her helm hard up, intending to wear round and rake the Hornet. But Lawrence quickly imitated the movement, got the better of his antagonist, and with all his guns blazing bore down upon her quarter. He then closed, and kept up so terrific a fire that in fifteen minutes from the beginning of the action the Englishman not only struck his colors, but hoisted them in the fore-rigging with the union down—which is a signal of distress. A few minutes later, the Peacock's main-mast tumbled.
An officer sent on board to take possession found that she had six feet of water in the hold, and was settling rapidly. Captain Peake and four of his men had been killed, and thirty-three wounded. Every effort was made to save the wounded men. Both vessels anchored, for the water here was but thirty-three feet deep. The prisoners were removed as fast as possible, while, to keep the Peacock afloat, her guns were thrown overboard, the shot-holes plugged, and the pumps manned; but in spite of this she went down, carrying nine of her men and three of the Hornet's. Four of the crew took the stern boat, which was supposed so damaged as to be useless, and paddled Four others climbed into the rigging of the fore-top, and as this remained above the surface when the hull touched bottom, they were saved. On the Hornet one man had been killed and two wounded by the enemy's fire, and her rigging was considerably damaged.
As another British war-vessel was not far away, the Hornet had to be put in fighting trim again with all speed, which was accomplished within four hours after the action. As she was crowded with prisoners and was short of water, she turned her prow toward home, arriving at Martha's Vineyard on the the 19th of March, and proceeding through Long Island Sound to New York. Congress voted Lawrence a gold medal, and to each of his commissioned officers a silver one; and he was soon promoted to the rank of captain, and given command of the frigate Chesapeake, then lying in Boston harbor. The very next naval battle was the one in which Lawrence lost his life, lost his ship, and lost a great part of his reputation. Captain Philip Bowes Vere Broke, commanding the British frigate Shannon, of thirty-eight guns, had been cruising along the New England coast for some time, looking for prizes, and especially for an opportunity to retrieve the honor of his flag in an encounter with some American war-ship of the size of his own. Lawrence was preparing for a cruise against the English fleet engaged in the Greenland whale-fishery; but when the Shannon appeared in the offing, June 1st, he hastily got his crew together and went out from Boston to fight her.
Broke had sent in to him a letter containing a formal challenge to try the powers of the two ships; but it did not arrive till the Chesapeake had sailed, and Lawrence never received it. One sentence of this letter is very significant, in that it contains the whole germ of the war. "I doubt not that you, equally confident of success, will feel convinced that it is only by repeated triumphs in even combats that your little navy can now hope to console your country for the loss of that trade it can no longer protect." That was it exactly. American trade, the grudge of British merchants, and the constant object of British hostilities, was to be permitted only so far as American guns were able to protect it; and since the American navy, as Captain Broke said, was little, while England's was large, it was confidently believed by his countrymen that this protection would not ultimately amount to much.
At six o'clock in the evening the vessels came within cannon-shot of each other, and the Shannon opened fire at once. But the Chesapeake remained silent till her whole broadside could be brought to bear; then she opened her ports, and for eight minutes there was a terrific and continuous roar. Now, as before, the Americans were the better gunners, and in this broadside firing the advantage was with the Chesapeake; but accident favored her antagonist and gave him an opportunity to use the advantages he possessed in other respects. Two or three shots that struck the rigging of the Chesapeake rendered her for a short time not perfectly manageable, and her mizzen-rigging fouled in the Shannons fore-chains. This exposed her to a raking fire, and her upper deck was swept at once by two of the enemy's guns.
In the broadside firing, Captain Lawrence had been wounded in the leg, the master was killed, the first lieutenant was disabled, and the marine officer, the fourth lieutenant, and the boatswain were mortally wounded. So great a proportion of officers struck down was a rare accident. To increase the misfortune, a Negro bugler had been substituted for the drummer, and when Lawrence ordered the signal to be sounded for boarding, it was found that the bugleman had crawled under the launch, and when he was hauled out he was still so frightened that he could not sound a note. Lawrence then passed down verbal orders for the boarders to come on deck, and at this moment he fell, shot through the body. As he was carried below, he exclaimed: "Tell the men to fire faster, and not give up the ship. Fight her till she sinks!"
But it was too late. The enemy were already on his deck in great numbers, and after a short and unorganized resistance his men were overcome and his ship was captured. The victors considerably increased the casualties by firing down the hatchways with musketry, in justification of which it is said that some one had fired up the hatch and killed a marine.
The havoc in both crews had been frightful for so short a battle. On the Shannon, twenty-four were killed and fifty-eight wounded; on the Chesapeake forty-seven were killed and ninety-eight wounded. Nearly one third of all the men engaged in the action had been struck. Captain Lawrence died in four days. His age was but thirty-one. He had been greatly admired for his personal bravery, his courteousness, his regard for the sailors under his command, and his wonderful nautical skill. In explanation of this defeat, it is said that Captain Broke had been for weeks giving his men a special training for such an encounter; while the Chesapeake had a heterogeneous crew, a part of them were new men, and many of the old ones were in a state of half mutiny from not having received prize money that was due them. Some of the officers were sick on shore, others were inexperienced, and several of the sailors were seen drunk in the streets of Boston an hour before they were summoned to go on board as the vessel was weighing anchor. These facts seem to be well established; but the explanation does not make it any the less a British victory. If Broke's men were under good discipline, while Lawrence's were not, he is entitled to as much credit for his achievement as if it had been accomplished through superior courage or any other means. And Lawrence, had he not died, might properly have been censured, or even punished, for going out to fight under such circumstances, when he could have waited till he had trained his crew. It was also said that the sailors entertained a superstitious belief that the Chesapeake was an unlucky ship. It was she that had been fired into by the Leopard, in 1807, when she had not a single gun in condition to return the shot; and just before her battle with the Shannon she had cruised across the Atlantic to the coast of Africa, and home again by way of the West Indies, without taking a single prize.
Broke's victory was a grateful salve to England's pride, so sorely wounded by the naval events of 1812, and her historians have never tired of dwelling upon it. One of the latest of them devotes more than eight pages to it alone, while he disposes of all the other sea-fights of this war in less than three.
The American brig Argus, of twenty guns, commanded by Captain William Henry Allen, after taking Hon. William H. Crawford to France as the new United States Minister at the French court, made a cruise in the English and Irish channels, where she captured twenty merchantmen. But in the evening of August 13th she had the misfortune to capture a vessel loaded with wine. The crew spent most of the night in transferring the cargo, and helped themselves liberally to the contents of some of the casks. Just before daylight, when all of them were tired out and many were intoxicated, they completed their misfortune by setting fire to the prize.
By the light of the burning vessel, the British brig Pelican, of twenty-one guns, sighted the Argus and bore down upon her. The Pelican got the weather-gage, and came within close range. The Argus opened with a broadside, and for three quarters of an hour the firing was kept up on both sides with great spirit. At the end of that time the American had lost her steering apparatus and most of her running rigging, while the enemy was lying under her stern, firing at leisure. Captain Allen was mortally wounded before the fighting had been going on five minutes, and his first lieutenant was disabled a few minutes later. There was now nothing for the Argus but to surrender. She had lost six men killed and seventeen wounded; the Pelican, three killed and five wounded.
Early in September the American brig Enterprise, of fourteen guns, commanded by Lieutenant William Burrows, was cruising along the coast of Maine in search of Canadian privateers, when, on the 5th, near Penguin Point, within sight of Portland, the British brig Boxer, of fourteen guns, Captain Samuel Blythe, was encountered. Both vessels prepared for action, and a few minutes past three o'clock they had approached within half pistol-shot, when both opened fire. The wind was light, the sea nearly smooth, and the broadsides of the Enterprise were very effective. Burrows had mounted a long gun in his poop-cabin, running it out of a window, and after the first broadside he drew ahead, sheered across the enemy's bow, and raked him with this gun. This was repeated, with other skilful manoeuvres, and in forty minutes the Boxer, being hailed, said she was ready to surrender, but could not haul down her colors, because they were nailed to the mast.
One of her officers is said to have sprung upon a gun, shaken his fists at the Americans, in a fearful state of excitement, and shouted "No! no! no!" adding a few opprobrious epithets, when a superior officer ordered him down. This exhibition, together with the ridiculous fact that a ship with her colors nailed was trying to surrender, brought a hearty laugh from the American crew, notwithstanding the shattered spars and bloody decks.
The Enterprise immediately ceased firing, and took possession of the prize. The American vessel had suffered very little injury, though her hull was peppered with grapeshot, a ball had passed through her foremast and one through her mainmast, and her upper rigging was considerably cut. She had lost one man killed and thirteen wounded, three of them mortally. The Boxer had been hulled repeatedly, three balls had passed through her foremast, some of her guns were dismounted, her top-gallant. forecastle was cut away, and her rigging badly injured. The number of her men that were killed has never been ascertained; fourteen were wounded. The commanders of the two vessels both fell, almost at the same moment: Blythe cut in two by an eighteen-pound ball, Burrows mortally wounded by a canister-shot. They were buried side by side in Portland, with the honors of war.
The poet Longfellow, who at that time was in his seventh year and lived in Portland, alludes to this battle in his poem entitled "My Lost Youth."
"'I remember the sea-fight far away,
How it thundered o'er the tide!
And the dead captains, as they lay
In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil bay
Where they in battle died.
And the sound of that mournful song
Goes through me with a thrill:
'A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'"
On the day when the Chesapeake was captured by the Shannon, three American war-vessels, under Commodore Decatur—the United States, the Macedonian, and the Hornet—were driven into the harbor of New London, Conn., by a superior force of British ships, and so rigorously was the blockade of the port kept up, that not one of the three got to sea again during the war. At the same time the land defences, manned by Connecticut militia, prevented the blockading squadron from entering the harbor to attack them. Decatur made many attempts to get out with his fleet, but was always frustrated by the vigilance of the blockaders, which he believed was assisted by traitors on shore. He declared that whenever he planned an escape, the enemy were warned of his intention by blue lights burned at the mouth of the harbor; and from this circumstance the opprobrious name of "Blue-Lights" was applied to the Federal party, which had opposed the war. It is not unlikely that something of this sort was done, either by traitors or by spies in the employ of the blockaders; but that the Federal party of Connecticut had anything to do with it is sufficiently refuted by the fact that the Connecticut militia, largely Federalists, not only protected Decatur's vessels when they might have permitted them to be captured, but rendered some distinguished services before the war was over, especially in the gallant defence of Stonington. Still the Federalists continued to oppose the war, though in a hopeless minority as to the whole country, and, like all parties out of power, sharply and unceasingly criticised the Administration. Their criticisms, too, were sometimes based on pretty strong facts, as, for instance, when they ridiculed the idea that it was a war for sailors' rights, by quoting an official circular to collectors of customs which forbade them to grant protections to Negro sailors. Even thus early were some of our politicians imbued with the notion that the color of a man's skin must necessarily make a vast difference with his rights under the government for which he paid taxes and bore arms.
The freedom of the Massachusetts coast from blockade was a source of irritation to the more southerly States; and when in December, 1813, the President complained to Congress that supplies were furnished to British cruisers, and other contraband trade was carried on through the ports of the Bay State, Congress laid a new embargo on the exportation, either by land or water, of any goods, produce, live stock, or specie. A similar embargo bill had passed the House of Representatives in July, but was then defeated in the Senate.
Up to the close of 1813, the English had captured from the Americans seven vessels of war, mounting one hundred and nineteen guns. In the same time, the Americans had captured from the English twenty-six vessels of war, mounting five hundred and sixty guns.
Their Number and Importance—Jefferson's Opinion of them—A London Journal's Prediction—Some of their Captures, and some of their Battles—The Yankee's Laughable Exploit.
In the naval operations of this, as of the preceding year, privateers played an important part. A large number had been commissioned; during the entire war, the whole number set afloat was two hundred and fifty-one. Fifty-eight of these belonged in the port of Baltimore, fifty-five in New York, forty in Salem, Mass., thirty-one in Boston, fourteen in Philadelphia, eleven in Portsmouth, N. H., and ten in Charleston, S. C.
These vessels were commonly small, or of moderate size, and were swift sailers. They carried a few broadside guns; but the peculiar feature of their armament was a long gun, generally an eighteen-pounder, mounted on the deck and turning on a swivel, so that it could be instantly pointed in any direction, no matter what might be the position of the vessel. This gun was called Long Tom.
These privateers not only captured merchant ships, but even fought with the smaller naval ves sels of the enemy, and sometimes conquered them. And they often had a double character, taking cargoes of merchandise for distant ports and at the same time being ready to fight on the way.
There was in 1812, as there has been since, more or less sentimental objection to privateering, which had come down from the days when privateers and pirates were the same. The argument in favor of the system was set forth with great clearness by Thomas Jefferson, in an article published about a month after the war began. He said:
"What is war? It is simply a contest between nations of trying which can do the other the most harm. Who carries on the war? Armies are formed and navies manned by individuals. How is a battle gained? By the death of individuals. What produces peace? The distress of individuals. What difference to the sufferer is it that his property is taken by a national or private armed vessel? Did our merchants, who have lost nine hundred, and seventeen vessels by British captures, feel any gratification that the most of them were taken by his Majesty's men-of-war? Were the spoils less rigidly exacted by a seventy-four-gun ship than by a privateer of four guns? and were not all equally condemned? War, whether on land or sea, is constituted of acts of violence on the persons and property of individuals; and excess of violence is the grand cause that brings about a peace. One man fights for wages paid him by the Government, or a patriotic zeal for the defence of his country; another, duly authorized, and giving the proper pledges for good conduct, undertakes to pay himself at the expense of the foe, and serve his country as effectually as the former, and Government, drawing all its supplies from the people, is in reality as much affected by the losses of the one as the other, the efficacy of its measures depending upon the energies and resources of the whole.
"In the United States, every possible encouragement should be given to privateering in time of war with a commercial nation. We have tens of thousands of seamen that without it would be destitute of the means of support, and useless to their country. Our national ships are too few to give employment to a twentieth part of them, or retaliate the acts of the enemy. But by licensing private armed vessels, the whole naval force of the nation is truly brought to bear on the foe; and while the contest lasts, that it may have the speedier termination, let every individual contribute his mite, in the best way he can, to distress and harass the enemy and compel him to peace." The truth is, privateering is the most merciful part of war; for it damages the enemy by capturing property rather than by destroying life, and in so doing it throws the immediate burden upon the commercial community behind the armies, who have to a large extent the power of making war and peace without personal risk to themselves, and often exhibit a willingness to sacrifice the lives of soldiers with the greatest freedom, so long as their own property is secure. Show them that their property is not secure in war, and you give them a strong motive for making peace. In modern times, the men who are to risk their lives if war arises, generally have little to say on the question whether there shall be a war; while those who are to risk their ships and cargoes, often have a determining voice. The greater that risk, the less the probability of war.
When the great powers of Europe drew up and signed the Treaty of Paris in 1856, they abolished privateering, so far as they were concerned. The lesser powers of Europe, and some of those on this continent, accepted the general invitation to join in the treaty. The United States Government replied that it would join in it, provided a clause were inserted to the effect that private property on the high seas, if not contraband of war, should be exempt from seizure not only by privateers but by the public armed vessels of an enemy. The great powers that originally made the treaty refused to insert any such clause; thereby confessing that their object was not to exempt private property from the burdens and derangements of war, but merely to control the mode of its seizure, and to secure for themselves with their large navies an advantage over nations that in time of peace have small navies or none at all. So the United States retains to this day her right to send out privateers if she becomes involved in war with any maritime people.
One at least of the London journals, the Statesman, foresaw the danger from privateers in 1812. When war was threatened, it said: "America cannot certainly pretend to wage a maritime war with us. She has no navy to do it with. But America has nearly a hundred thousand as good seamen as any in the world, all of whom would be actively employed against our trade on every part of the ocean, in their fast-sailing ships of war, many of which will be able to cope with our small cruisers; and they will be found to be sweeping the West India seas, and even carrying desolation into the chops of the Channel."
All this, and more, the two hundred and fifty privateers accomplished. They cruised in every sea, and wrought such havoc with British commerce as had never been known before. Coggeshall's history of the service enumerates about fifteen hundred prizes taken by them in the two and a half years of war, and these were not all of the captures by privateers alone; while the government war-vessels, in their cruises, added considerably to the number.
The fortunes of the privateers were of the most varied kind. Some of them made long cruises without falling in with a single British merchantman of which they could make a prize. Others took enough to enrich every man of the crew. The Surprise, of Baltimore, took twenty in a single month. The True-Blooded Yankee was one of the most daring and most fortunate. On one cruise she took twenty-seven prizes in thirty-seven days. On the same cruise she captured a small island on the coast of Ireland, and held possession of it for six days. She also took a small seaport town of Scotland, and burned seven vessels in the harbor. A partial list of the spoils with which she was laden when she arrived in a French port, will give some idea of the business. She had eighteen bales of Turkish carpets, forty-three bales of raw silk, weighing six tons, twenty boxes of gums, twenty-four packs of beaver skins, one hundred and sixty dozen swan skins, forty-six packs of other skins, a hundred and ninety hides, a quantity of copper, and various other articles.
The York, of Baltimore, after cruising on the coast of Brazil and through the West Indies, returned home with prizes valued at $1,500,000.
The Snapdragon, of Newbern, N. C., captured a brig with a cargo, mainly dry goods, worth half a million dollars, and got safely into port with her.
The Saucy Jack, of Charleston, took the ship Mentor, with a cargo valued at $300,000, and sent her into New Orleans; and a short time afterward the same privateer took a brig with $60,000 worth of dry goods.
The Yankee, in a cruise of a hundred and fifty days, scoured the whole western coast of Africa, taking eight prizes, and came home with thirty-two bales of fine goods, six tons of ivory, and $40,000 in gold dust; all together worth nearly $300,000.
The Leo, of Baltimore, captured an East India-man worth two and a half million dollars, which was recaptured by an English sloop-of-war, though not till the Leo had taken off $60,000 in bullion.
The Governor Tompkins, of New York, near the Madeira Islands captured the Nereid, with an assorted cargo valued at $375,000.
The St. Lawrence, with a cargo valued at over $300,000, was captured and sent into Portsmouth, N. H., where she was proved to be an English vessel, and condemned, though she had professed to be American.
Perhaps the most valuable single prize taken in the war was the Queen, captured by the General Armstrong, of New York. She carried sixteen guns, and was not taken without a stubborn fight, in which her captain, first lieutenant, and nine men were killed. She was valued at nearly $500,000, but on her way into port was wrecked off Nantucket.
One prize contained wine and raisins valued at $75,000; another, $70,000 worth of cotton; another, $20,000 worth of indigo; another, seven hundred tons of mahogany; another $70,000 worth of rum and sugar; another, $150,000 worth of gums, almonds, and beeswax; another, $23,000 in specie, and still another, $80,000 in specie.
All this looks very much like robbery, and in truth it was robbery, unless the war, on the part of the Americans, was justifiable. But it is certainly more humane to conquer the enemy by robbing his merchants than by killing his men; and there can be no question that the exploits of these privateers did more to bring the war between England and the United States to an end, and prevent another one, than drawn battles, however gallantly fought, and futile expeditions against Canada. But the exploits of the privateers did not consist solely in plundering unarmed merchantmen. They were often pursued and attacked by British men-of-war, and some of the English packet-ships carried heavy guns, and would not surrender without a desperate fight.
The privateer schooner Governor Tompkins, a few days after the capture of the Nereid in December, 1812, gave chase to what appeared to be a large merchantman. But she proved to be a frigate in disguise, and a sudden squall sent the schooner under her guns before she could change her course. The frigate opened fire at once, and her first broadside killed two men and wounded six. It also blew up a box of cartridges and set fire to some pistols and tube-boxes in the companion-way, all of which exploded and went flying in every direction. The schooner's little battery returned the fire, but her principal exertions were to get out of the way of her powerful antagonist. A chase of two hours ensued, during most of which time the vessels were within gunshot and the firing was kept up. The Tompkins threw overboard all the lumber from the deck, and two thousand pounds of shot, and got out her sweeps, and so escaped. Her captain, Nathaniel Shaler, said in a letter describing the action: "The name of one of my poor fellows who was killed ought to be registered on the book of fame, and remembered with reverence as long as bravery is considered a virtue. He was a black man, by the name of John Johnson. A twenty-four-pound shot struck him in the hip, and took away all the lower part of his body. In this state the poor, brave fellow lay on the deck and several times exclaimed to his shipmates, 'Fire away, boys! neber haul de color down!' The other was also a black man, by the name of John Davis, and was struck in much the same way. He fell near me, and several times requested to be thrown overboard, saying he was only in the way of the others."
Captain Boyle, in the privateer Comet, of Baltimore, made a remarkable cruise, early in 1813, on the coast of Brazil and in the West Indies. On the 14th of January he overhauled a Portuguese brig-of-war which was convoying three English merchantmen—a ship and two brigs—from Pernambuco. Boyle informed the captain that he had no right to do anything of the sort, and that he should proceed to make prizes of them. As the man-of-war insisted on protecting them, there was a fight—one vessel against four, for the merchantmen were heavily armed. It began at half past eight o'clock in the evening, and was carried on by moonlight. Every vessel had on a crowd of canvas. The Comet ran alongside the ship and one of the brigs, and opened her broadside upon both of them. The man-of-war then fired grape and round shot into the Comet, which returned the compliment, but stuck close to the merchantmen. They frequently separated, to give the man-of-war a chance at the privateer, when the privateer would pour a whole broadside into them, and then turn his attention to the larger antagonist. An hour after midnight, the ship, which had been badly cut to pieces and len-dered unmanageable, struck her flag; and soon afterward the two brigs, which had been almost as badly damaged, surrendered. All this while the man-of-war was hovering near and exchanging occasional broadsides with the Comet, till the moon set, and it became dark and squally. One of the brigs had been taken possession of by Boyle; the other and the ship, assisted by the man-of-war, escaped him and made their way back to Pernambuco. On the man-of-war the first lieutenant and five men were killed, and several wounded, the captain mortally.
On the 25th of the same month, the privateer Dolphin, Captain W. S. Stafford, cruising off the coasts of Spain and Portugal, fell in with a large ship and a brig, and fought them both. The privateer carried ten guns, the ship sixteen, and the brig ten. After a spirited action, in which the Dolphin lost four men, she captured both of them, and sent them home to Baltimore. The same privateer, in November, was attacked just outside of Charleston harbor by five boats from an English man-of-war. Captain Stafford tore one of the boats to pieces by a discharge of grape-shot, and as the other boats had employment enough in saving their unfortunate comrades, the attack failed. The man-of-war then fired a broadside at the Dolphin and sailed away.
The privateer Lottery, Captain Southcomb, while at anchor in Chesapeake Bay, February 15th, was captured by nine British barges, in which were two hundred and forty men; but not till after a fight of an hour and a half, in which the six guns of the Lottery had made sickening havoc with the men in the crowded barges. Captain Southcomb was badly wounded.
On the 11th of March the privateer General Armstrong, Captain Guy R. Champlin, of New York, encountered, off Surinam, what she supposed to be an English privateer. The Armstrong bore down upon her, fired the starboard broadside, wore ship and gave her the larboard broadside, and was then about to attempt boarding, but found out that the enemy was a frigate, carrying twenty-four guns. The battle lasted three quarters of an hour, when the Armstrong succeeded in getting away. Captain Champ-lin, badly wounded, lay on the cabin floor, directly over the magazine, with a pistol in his hand, when he overheard some talk about striking the colors. He immediately ordered the surgeon to go on deck and tell the men that if any one of them dared to strike the colors, he would discharge his pistol into the magazine and blow them all up together. In his log-book he wrote: "In this action we had six men killed and sixteen wounded, and all the halyards of the headsails shot away; the fore-mast and bowsprit one quarter cut through, and all the fore and main shrouds but one shot away; both mainstays and running rigging cut to pieces; a great number of shot through our sails, and several between wind and water, which caused our vessel to leak. There were also a number of shot in our hull."
The privateer Young Teazer met a singular fate. In June she was chased by a British man-of-war. Her lieutenant had been once captured, and released on parole, and had gone into the service again without waiting to be exchanged. When he saw a probability of another capture, he seized a firebrand and ran into the cabin, and in another moment the vessel was blown to fragments, and every man on board perished, except seven sailors who were standing on the forecastle.
The privateer Wasp, carrying two guns, had a battle of nine hours' duration, on the 31st of July, with the British war-schooner Bream, of ten guns. For the last forty-five minutes the action was at close quarters, and the Wasp then surrendered.
In August the privateer Decatur, carrying seven guns, Captain Dominique Diron, was cruising in the track of West India traders, when on the 5th she encountered the English war-schooner Dominica, of sixteen guns, and after a bloody battle captured her. It was at first a running fight, the Dominica firing frequent broadsides, and the Decatur answering with her Long Tom and volleys of musketry. After several futile attempts to board, Captain Diron succeeded in forcing his bowsprit over the enemy's stern, and sending the jib-boom through her mainsail. The next moment, while a part of his crew kept up the musketry fire, the remainder rushed on board the Dominica, and a hand-to-hand slaughter at once began. Men were cut down with swords, and shot with pistols, till the deck was covered with the dead and wounded. The English crew did not surrender till their captain, G. W. Barrette, was killed, all the other officers except the surgeon and one midshipman either killed or wounded, and altogether sixty men disabled. Of the Decatur's men, five were killed and fifteen wounded.
The Globe privateer had a desperate fight, on the 3d of November, with two heavily armed packet brigs. Broadside after broadside was exchanged at the distance of a few yards, and the brigs were compelled to strike. But when the Globe hauled alongside to take possession of one of them, she raised her colors again and fired a broadside; after which both brigs sailed slowly away, while the Globe, which had lost twenty-three men, was too badly crippled to follow.
The privateer Saratoga, of four guns, captured the English mail packet Morgiana, which carried eighteen guns, by boarding. There was an obstinate defence, and two of the packet's men were killed and five wounded, while the Saratoga lost three killed and seven wounded. During the fight the mail was thrown overboard.
Near the Canary Islands a British sloop-of-war decoyed the privateer Grampus under her guns, and then suddenly opened her ports and gave her a whole broadside at half pistol-shot. This discharge killed the captain and one man and wounded several others, and damaged the rigging badly, so that: the Grampus escaped with difficulty.
On Monday, the 5th of July, the Yankee, a fishingsmack, was fitted out in New York harbor to capture by stratagem the British sloop-of-war Eagle. A calf, a sheep, a goose, and three fishermen were placed conspicuously on the deck, while below were concealed forty men armed with muskets. She then sailed down the bay. The Eagle overhauled her, and ordered her to report to the Commodore. Suddenly, at the signal word "Lawrence," the forty men appeared, levelled their muskets across the deck of the Eagle, and with one volley killed three of her men and drove the others below. She struck without firing a gun, and as she was taken up the harbor she was greeted by the cheers of a multitude of people who were on the Battery, celebrating Independence day.
While an American fishing-smack was thus capturing a British sloop-of-war in the harbor of New York, on the other side of the ocean the London Evening Star was just saying: "The American navy must be annihilated; her arsenals and dockyards consumed. The American merchant-vessels ought perhaps to be permitted to arm against the pirates of the Mediterranean or the Ladrones of China; but, like certain places of entertainment in England, they ought to be compelled to exhibit in large letters, on their main-sails, Licensed to carry guns, pursuant to a British act of Parliament."
Condition of Affairs at the Opening of the Third Year—Congressional Appropriations—Russian Offers of Mediation—Jackson's Preparations—Battles of Emucfau, Enotachopco, and Horseshoe Bend.
At the beginning of the third year of the war the prospects of the Americans were more discouraging than at any previous period. The European wars had come to an end for the time, Napoleon having been overthrown at Leipsic, and Great Britain, with an immense navy and an abundance of veteran troops, was at liberty to turn her entire attention upon the enemy across the Atlantic. Indeed, her fleet on our coast had been gradually increasing for several months, and Admirals Warren and Cockburn had shown a determination not to confine their operations to combats of vessel with vessel, but wherever practicable to send a force ashore to harass the people, burn their homes, and carry off their movable property. Harrison's victory was almost the only achievement of the American land forces worth mentioning. The little navy was as gallant as ever, and had suffered no defeat in anything like an equal fight, except in the case of the Chesapeake; but now it seemed likely to be overwhelmed by a power that could send against it a thousand war-ships. Two powerful ones had already been sent for the special purpose of capturing one of our cruisers, the Essex, with orders to follow her wherever she went, and take her at all hazards. The operations of the privateers had struck the English nation in its most tender spot, the pocket, and roused it to a furious determination for vengeance; while the London journals were boldly talking of schemes for using the opportunity to cut off various slices of our territory.
Though the Federal party had declined in popular strength, its leaders in Congress opposed the war as bitterly as ever; but after considerable debate an act was passed to increase the regular army to sixty thousand men, enlisted for five years. A bounty of a hundred and twenty-four dollars was voted for recruits, and eight dollars to each man who brought in one. Seven hundred men were added to the Marine Corps, half a million dollars appropriated for a floating battery, and a hundred dollars offered for every prisoner brought home by a privateer. There was a surplus of a million dollars in the treasury, and five millions were yet to be paid in from loans, while the revenue for the ensuing year was estimated at ten millions. The expenditures were estimated at forty-five millions, and Congress authorized a new loan of twenty-five millions, and a reissue of ten millions in treasury notes.
The Russian Government offered its friendly offices as a mediator for peace, three times in the course of the war; but each time the offer was rejected by England. Once—in March, 1813—the offer was formally accepted on the part of the United States, and Albert Gallatin and James A. Bayard, who believed the English Government would accept it as readily, sailed for St. Petersburg, to join John Quincy Adams, American Minister at the Russian Court, in negotiating the peace. The London Courier probably spoke the sentiments of a large part of the British public when it said:
"We hope the Russian mediation will be refused. Indeed, we are sure it will. We have a love for our naval preeminence that cannot bear to have it even touched by a foreign hand. Russia can be hardly supposed to be adverse to the principle of armed neutrality, and that idea alone would be sufficient to make us decline the offer. We must take our stand, never to commit our naval rights to the mediation of any power. This is the flag we must nail to the national mast, and go down rather than strike it. The hour of concession and compromise is past. Peace must be the consequence of punishment to America; and retraction of her insolent demands must precede negotiation. The thunder of our cannon must first strike terror into the American shores, and Great Britain must be seen and felt in all the majesty of her might, from Boston to Savannah, from the lakes of Canada to the mouths of the Mississippi."
The English Government declined the offer of mediation, as before, but expressed a willingness to nominate plenipotentiaries to make direct negotiations with the American commissioners, suggesting that the conference be held in London, unless the Americans preferred Gottenburg, Sweden. This answer was made in September, 1813, and reached the United States Government in official form in November. The President communicated it to Congress early in January, 1814, and the proposition was accepted; Gottenburg being chosen as the place, and Henry Clay and Jonathan Russell being added to Messrs. Adams, Bayard, and Gallatin as commissioners. Their instructions were, to insist on an absolute discontinuance of the practice of search and impressment, and to offer, in consideration of this, an agreement to exclude British seamen from American vessels, and to surrender deserters.
But the best way to secure an honorable peace-and indeed it will be the only way, until the millennium—is by exhibiting an ability to prosecute successful war. With the new appropriations, the Administration, while sending its peace commissioners abroad, prepared for more vigorous war within our own borders.
After a great deal of trouble with troops who believed their terms of service had expired, and who finally marched home in spite of all arguments and protests, Jackson, who had been made a major-general, found himself at Fort Strother in January, 1814, with nine hundred raw recruits and a few dozen men who had participated in his autumn campaign. With these and two hundred Indians he set out on a raid into the country of the Creeks.
On the 22d, near Emucfau, on Tallapoosa River, he was attacked by a large force, who made a feint on his right and then fell heavily upon his left. The General had anticipated this plan, and strengthened his left, so that after a stubborn fight the enemy were routed and pursued for three miles.
Two days later, on the return march, the troops were in the act of crossing Enotachopco Creek, when the Indians attacked again. After a few shots, the rear guard retreated in disorder, leaving not more than a hundred men to face the enemy; but these, by determined bravery, and especially by skilful use of a six-pounder with grape-shot, defeated the savages, and pursued them for two miles. Jackson himself acted as gunner. He lost in this raid about a hundred men.
In February, Jackson had a new army of five thousand men, including a regiment of United States regulars, in which Sam Houston was an ensign. The only difficulty now was with supplies; but this was enormous. The distance from Fort Deposit to Fort Strother was only forty miles, but the roads were so bad that a wagon-train required seven days to accomplish it, though there was a horse to every barrel of flour in the load. Nearly sixty miles southeast of Fort Strother, and the same distance northeast of Montgomery, is Horseshoe Bend in the Tallapoosa, enclosing a peninsula of one hundred acres, which is less than five hundred feet wide at the neck. Here the Creek warriors, to the number of a thousand, had encamped and fortified themselves, when Jackson, with nearly three thousand men, was marching against them, for the avowed purpose of extermination. The Americans reached the place on the morning of March 27th, and Jackson sent General Coffee with the mounted men and Indians to cross the stream two miles be low, countermarch, and take position on the bank in rear of the village. When he received the signal of their arrival, he moved forward with his main force, and planted two field-pieces to play upon the breastwork of logs and earth which crossed the neck of the peninsula. But a two hours' cannonade produced no effect upon it. Coffee and his Indians now crossed the river, set fire to the village, and attacked the enemy in the rear. As Jackson saw by the rising smoke what had been done, he stormed the breastwork in front, and for a little while there was desperate hand-to-hand fighting through the loop-holes. Then the troops, following the example of Major L. P. Montgomery and Ensign Houston, mounted the works, leapt down among the enemy, and plied the bayonet right and left till the Indians broke and fled. They neither asked for quarter nor received it. Whether they hid themselves in the thickets or attempted to swim the stream, they were hotly pursued, hunted out, and mercilessly shot. A portion found shelter under the bank, where felled timber and a rude breastwork protected them. Jackson summoned them to surrender, promising to spare their lives; but they shot his messenger. After he had failed to dislodge them either by an artillery fire or a storming party, his troops set fire to the timber, and shot the Indians as they were driven out by the flames. At the close of that day, five hundred and fifty-seven of the Creeks lay dead on the peninsula. It is believed that not more than two hundred escaped. One chief, Manowa, saved himself after he had been badly wounded, by plunging into the water, holding himself under by grasping a root, and breathing through a reed that reached from his mouth to the surface. After nightfall he rose, swam the stream, and stole away.
Jackson lost one hundred and thirty-one white soldiers and fifty-four Cherokees. Major Montgomery was killed, and Ensign Houston was wounded.
The savagery of this warfare is explained by the fact that the Creeks were not fighting for any cause of their own, real or pretended, but only as mercenaries of the English. In a letter written at this time, Jackson said: "While we fight the savage, who makes war only because he delights in blood, and who has gotten his booty when he has scalped his victim, we are, through him, contending against an enemy of more inveterate character and deeper design. So far as my exertions can contribute, the purposes, both of the savage and his instigator, shall be defeated."
By these battles, the power of the Creeks was completely broken. Jackson compelled the remnant of the tribe to move north, and that summer they were fed by the Government.